Tamika Bell

When you live in alignment with your purpose, that's what happens. I've been winging it the whole way, just throwing it to the wall to see what sticks. I had one idea in my head about being a crafter and doing small business branding, but then a seed was planted by a woman I met at a networking event who asked if I'd ever thought about teaching arts therapy, and that changed everything. I believe in what I'm doing and I believe in helping the world. Even though I'm an introvert by nature and have to put on that extroverted personality for my business, I do it because I believe in what I'm doing. It's scary every single time because I have to not only sell my brand, but I have to sell myself, and when you're passionate about something and speaking about it, there's a bit of nerves there because you're always trying to get people to understand what you're seeing. But I keep going because I'm living in alignment with my purpose.

The best career advice I ever received was not advice at all. It was a question. A woman I met at a networking event simply asked me if I had ever thought about what I was actually capable of beyond what I was already doing. That one question redirected everything. Sometimes the best guidance does not tell you where to go. It just makes you honest about where you have not gone yet.

The number one advice I would give any woman starting their own business is, once you figure out exactly what it is that you want to do, be honest with yourself about what it takes to be an entrepreneur. Do you really just want to do that hobby or that thing, or are you ready to have to be a CEO, a manager, and a technician until you're ready to hire on and you get people that see behind your vision? It's so much more to it than just starting a business, and you have to be emotionally ready for that rollercoaster. For any woman that is looking to become an entrepreneur, I would tell them to research and think really hard about what being an entrepreneur is before they do that, because everybody has great ideas, but not everybody can hold on through the ups and downs of entrepreneurship.

The biggest challenge and the biggest opportunity are the same thing, people still do not fully understand what creative wellness is. The market has watered it down into aesthetics and activities and the real work, the science behind what happens in the body when you create, the spirit behind why it matters, the art as the actual methodology, gets lost in the noise. That is the challenge. The opportunity is that nobody has built the container I have built. There is no one doing this the way Creative Safe Spaces does this, rooted in art, science, and spirit simultaneously, meeting people where they are, and creating experiences that shift them without them even realizing it is happening. The gap in the market is exactly where I am standing.

As a Black woman, as a neurodivergent woman, as a mom, as someone that grew up at the time where the term was bisexual and I almost got jumped in high school, I understand the need for safe spaces, and currently with the way this administration tore apart DEI, it's needed even more now. It's true to my heart. I'm trying to show the community what it looks like to support our first responders, not just having them support us, basically showing human kindness, because that was something that was absolutely lost during COVID. The world just needs to be a little bit more kind, genuinely. What Creative Safe Spaces is really about is being the container for people to authentically be themselves so that they can make the connections they need with the people that are gonna support them. I'm not just trying to get people to see each other at networking meetings, but to actually build relationships. I want people to understand how vital creativity is to your life and your wellness, and I make the container for that safe space where they can release without even realizing it.